Kijong-dong

Supposed village in North Korea, north of the DMZ

Kijŏng dong, Kijŏngdong, or Kijŏng tong is reportedly a Potemkin village in P'yŏnghwa ri , Panmun guyok, Kaesong Special City, North Korea. It is situated in the North's half of the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). it has been widely referred to as 'Propaganda Village' by those outside North Korea, especially in South Korean and Western media. Kijŏng dong is one of two villages permitted to remain in the wide DMZ set up under the 1953 armistice during the Korean War; away.

The North Korean government says the village contains a 200 family collective farm, serviced by a child care center, kindergarten, primary and secondary schools, and a hospital. However, the South says the town is an uninhabited village built in the 1950s in a propaganda effort to encourage South Korean defection and to house the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) soldiers manning the network of artillery positions, fortifications and underground marshalling bunkers that surround the border zone. The village features a number of brightly painted, poured concrete multi story buildings and apartments, many apparently wired for electricity. The town was oriented so that the bright blue roofs and white sides of the buildings next to the massive DPRK flag would be the most distinguishing features when viewed from across the border. Scrutiny with modern telescopic lenses, however, has led to the conclusion that the buildings are concrete shells lacking window glass or even interior rooms, with building lights turned on and off at set times and empty sidewalks swept by caretakers in an effort to preserve the illusion of activity. The village is surrounded by extensive cultivated fields, clearly visible to visitors to the North Korean side of the DMZ.

In the 1980s, the South Korean government built a tall flagpole with a flag of South Korea in Daeseong dong It is now the sixth tallest flagpole in the world, and the tallest supported one.

Massive loudspeakers mounted on several of the buildings deliver DPRK propaganda broadcasts directed towards the South. As its value in inducing defections diminished over time, particularly as South Korea caught up with the North economically in the 1960s and 1970s, the content was switched to condemnatory anti Western speeches, agitprop operas, and patriotic marching music for up to 20 hours a day. The broadcasts resumed after escalating tensions as a result of the January 2016 nuclear test. On 23 April 2018, both North and South Korea officially cancelled their border propaganda broadcasts.